It was great to work with Duane Raymond and George Irish to create a FairSay campaign/fundraising training in Ottawa on October 15th. I've corresponded with Duane for many years and have always wanted to make the trip to Oxford to go to the eCampaigning Forum. After organizing these events for over a decade, Duane has built quite a considerable base of knowledge and an extensive global network.

In the afternoon session we had very interesting conversations on building a digital election strategy for 2015, retaining supporters online, effective eCampaigning models and converting online activists to donors. There were two streams and the discussions in both were quite rich.

Having worked with the NGO community in Ottawa for nearly 25 years, I know how difficult it can be to bring folks out to an event. Having discussions that talk about the intersections between politics and technology are fairly rare in this town. It was quite refreshing to meet new people and learn some great new approaches.

Although I try to keep up with developments in online campaigns, I was excited to learn about GreenPeace's Mobilisation Lab. It was great to see the work of Amnesty International Belgium's Wake Up, Humans! campaign. There are so many ways to re-inforce positive images of identity using innovative approaches like this.

I thought the discussions around the NationBuilder platform were quite interesting too. Groups like Ecology Ottawa have used it quite effectively and it is interesting to see how it is being used. George gave some great examples for how Amnesty International is using this for local campaigns.

There is really so much going on in this space.

If you are interested in staying informed about upcoming sessions, the best way is probably to sign up for the fairsay ECF list.

OpenConcept was happy to facilitate this event to help start this discussion in Ottawa. We also hosted the event at our new location above the West End Well.